1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an information processing technology implemented in information processing apparatuses such as game devices.
2. Description of the Related Art
Generally, game software is distributed and sold in the form of ROM media such as optical disks, magneto-optical disks, and blue ray disks. Since the game software recorded on a ROM medium cannot be rewritten, fixing of bugs in the game software and modification/addition of functions are addressed by applying a patch. Patent document No. 1 discloses a game device adapted to compare the version information stored in the recording medium with the version information included in the patch file, load the startup file assigned newer version information into the memory, and perform the process of starting the game.    [Patent document No. 1] US 2008/0141018
When the game device is turned on, the operating system (hereinafter, simply referred to as “OS”) is started, preparing an environment in which to execute the game software. The OS is updated fairly frequently for reasons of bug fixes or expansion of functions. When the OS is updated, patch files subsequently created are usually designed to run on the updated OS.
Since the updated OS encompasses the functions of the previous versions of the OS, the game device is capable of creating an environment in which the patch file can be used, by installing the latest version of the OS without fail. However, since the patch file is applied to the game software, it is not normally necessary to install the latest version of the OS in the game device unless a patch file is available for the game software. Since the data volume of the OS is relatively large, it is not favorable, in terms of time and cost, to download the OS in the game device each time the OS is updated and regardless of the need. Accordingly, there is a need to build a scheme for efficiently downloading the OS when the game device needs the OS for the execution of the game software.